This blog is produced by the Consortium for Project Leadership at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, for anyone interested in the practical application of leadership to project management. We aim to publish meaningful articles by various authors on a monthly basis focused on stories about lessons learned in leading and managing projects.

Monday, March 23, 2015

This month’s blog is adapted from a
recent article entitled “What Successful Project Managers Do” published
in the March 2015 issue of the MIT Sloan Management Review. In addition to Alex
Laufer and Jeff Russell, the other co-authors are Edward J. Hoffman,
NASA's Chief Knowledge Officer, and Scott W. Cameron, Global Project
Management Technology Process Owner at Procter & Gamble.

In the article we demonstrated that
the first role assumed by successful project managers in a variety of
industries is to develop project collaboration. In today’s blog we present four
examples that highlight the paramount impact of project collaboration.

Example A, The Power of Trust

NASA project manager Tim Flores
looked at three projects at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL): the
Pathfinder, Climate Orbiter, and Polar Lander. Although all three projects had
the same guiding principles, similar scope, and shared elements (including some
team members), the Pathfinder was a success while the other two failed.

Flores thought he’d find that the
Pathfinder project stood out from the others in things like resources,
constraints, and personnel. To some extent this was true, but what he found to
be the primary difference was the level of collaboration. The Pathfinder team
developed trusting relationships within an open culture. They felt free to make
decisions without fearing severe punishment for mistakes. The other two project
teams never developed such a high level of trust.

Example B, The Power of Openness

NASA’s Wide-Field
Infrared Explorer (WIRE) mission studied how galaxies formed and evolved. They
used a telescope so delicate it was sealed inside a solid hydrogen cryostat.
Shortly after launch, the cryostat’s cover ejected prematurely and the Explorer
craft tumbled wildly through space. The entire mission failed.

Jim Watzin, project manager at NASA
and a team member at the WIRE project, commented on the official NASA
after-action report: “WIRE failed because people
could not or would not communicate well with each other….Individuals simply
were uncomfortable allowing others to see their work.” He added: “The real
lesson of this loss is that any team member that does not participate as
a true team player should be excused (from the project).”

Example C, The Power of Partnership

Allen, a payload manager in NASA’s
Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE) project, developed trust between his team
and 20 groups of instrument-developers using a three-stage
plan. First, he picked team members who could operate in a university
environment—they knew when to bend or even break the rules. Second, he
permanently moved his team into a university environment, realizing it would
provide a more open, flexible culture than the home-base environment. Third, he
came up with an uncommon process for interacting with the scientist groups.

Allen anticipated that it would be
difficult to get the scientists to regard his team as partners. Having dealt
with NASA before, the scientists tended to believe Allen and his people would
demand tons of paperwork and that things be done “just so.” Many of the scientists
weren’t even sure they should share with Allen’s team the problems they were
encountering.

Because Allen’s team had to review
instrument development, he believed the best way to do this was to focus on
building trust and convincing the scientists his team was there to help them
problem-solve. So Allen and his team went to each university and stayed on-site
for an extended period of time, spending days and nights working with the
scientists, helping them solve their problems. They were there not as
controllers but as partners.

Example D, The Power of
Interdependence

Procter & Gamble (P&G)
launched a large construction project at one of its European plants. Karl, the contractor’s
project manager, had no interest in team-building efforts and kept brushing
them off. Pierre, the P&G project manager, finally found an opportunity to
change Karl’s attitude. Three months into construction, the contractor (Karl’s
group) accidentally placed the foundations off the mark, pouring about 600
lineal feet of foundation concrete in the wrong place.

Pierre recognized the volatile and
disruptive nature of the mistake. He could have ordered Karl to fix the mistake
by tearing down the foundations and starting over, but he realized that would
have damaged the contractor’s reputation and ego. He understood that the best
plans evolve in waves as the project unfolds and more information becomes
available and reliable. He thus chose a different approach. Pierre took several
days to meet and negotiate with users and designers, modified the interior
plant layout, and minimized the damage without tearing down the foundations and
starting over.

While the mistake resulted in costly
changes, Karl’s reputation was preserved and the project wasn’t delayed.
Eventually Karl came around to embrace Pierre’s team approach—namely, “If they
fail, we fail.” Realizing they are all interdependent led to the development of
a collaborative relationship. Developing mutual interdependence and
mutual responsibility for project results is key to project success.

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What is "Living Order"?

Embracing the "living order" concept is the first practice of project leadership. Leaders must be comfortable leading in today's environment of constant change. Bergson (1907) identified two types of order: the traditional concept of perfect geometric order, and living order -- which can be messy, even chaotic, with project problems and surprises in an evolving organization.